Rex v Croucamp

• Jurisdiction: South Africa
• Citation: 1949 (1) SA 377 (A)

Rex v Croucamp
1949 (1) SA 377 (A)

1949 (1) SA p377

Citation	1949 (1) SA 377 (A)
Court	Appellate Division
Judge	Watermeyer CJ, Centlivres JA and Van Den Heever JA
Heard	November 9, 1948
Judgment	November 23, 1948

Flynote : Sleutelwoorde

Criminal law — Attempt — Attempting to receive stolen property — What constitutes — What proof sufficient.

Headnote : Kopnota

Where an accused, who had been asked by a housebreaker to buy a suit of clothes which he knew was stolen, had asked to be shown the suit and had examined it until interrupted by the arrival of a policeman,

Held, that the accused's actions had not yet gone far enough to constitute an attempt to receive stolen property well knowing it to be stolen.

Case Information

Appeal, on a question of law reserved, from a conviction in the Witwatersrand Local Division (LUCAS, A.J.) sitting with a jury. The facts appear from the judgment of WATERMEYER, C.J.

J. P. van den Berg, at the request of the Court, for the accused: As to the essential elements of the offence of receiving stolen property knowing it to have been stolen, see Gardiner and Lansdown, South African Criminal Law and Procedure (5th ed., vol. 2, pp. 1560 - 1); as to what acts constitute it, see Gardiner and Lansdown (supra, vol. 1, p. 107); Rex v Sharpe (1903, T.S. 876); Rex v Schoombie (1945 AD 547); Halsbury's Laws of England (Hailsham ed., vol. 9, p. 259); Rex v Nlhovo (1921 AD 501). Mere acts of preparation, though done with criminal intent, do not amount to an attempt to commit a crime; see Rex v Sharpe (supra). An act is an act of mere preparation when it is an act not sufficiently near to stand as the first or some subsequent step in direct movement towards the commission of the intended offence; see Rex v Robinson (1915, 24 Cox 726); Rex v Magatlate (1928 TPD 615). In the present case the facts merely show an intention or plan to negotiate which is not indictable; see Rex v Nlhovo (supra, at p. 495).

d'Arcy Ussher, for the Crown: On the facts the Court a quo correctly found that the transaction had gone far enough to constitute an attempt to receive stolen property, appellant well knowing it to have been stolen; see Rex v Schoombie (1945 AD 541 at pp. 545 - 7); People v Jaffe (9 L.R.A. (N.S.) 263); Rex v Hlatwayo and Another (1933 TPD 441 at p. 444); Rex v van Zyl (1942 TPD 291 at p. 297); Rex v Robin (1926 TPD 445 at p. 447 - 8, 450); Rex v Lionda (1944 AD 348 at pp. 355 - 6);

1949 (1) SA p378

Rex v Adelburg (1891, 8 S.C. 234); Russell, Crimes (9th ed., vol. 2 at 1054 - 5); Rex v Watson (1916, 2 K.B. 385).

van den Berg, in reply.

Cur adv vult.

Postea (November...